Hair curler



July 7, 1964 FIGI F. D. BUZZELLI 3,139,889

HAIR CURLER Filed June 2. 1961 INVENTOR. FRANK D. BUZZELLI.

ATTORNEY.

United States Patent Filed June 2, 1961, Ser. No. 114,518 1 Claim. (Cl.132-39) This invention relates to curlers for ladies hair and moreparticularly to such a curler which is adapted to be worn in comfortduring sleep.

Women often wear hair curlers during sleep, creating an obvious problemin maintaining comfort. Accordingly, it has been previously proposed toprovide hair curlers formed of a resilient material which would deformunder the pressures exerted between the Wearers head and the supportingsurface particularly during sleep in order to minimize the discomfortwhich a non-resilient curler would cause. Difficulties have beenencountered in maintaining the hair in a curled position on suchresilient rollers because their deformation cause the hair to unwind andbecome tangled. It is therefore a primary object of the presentinvention to provide a hair curler which is capable of deforming underpressure so that it may be comfortably worn during sleep and yet adaptedto retain the hair in a normal curled manner during such deformation.

The rollers are normally cylindrical in shape and hair is wrapped abouta transverse perimeter. I have determined that the loosening andtangling of hair which occurs upon use of a resilient roller is not theresult of deformation about the longitudinal axis of the roller or ofcompression of the roller in a transverse direction but rather resultsfrom the reduction in the transverse perimeter of the roller upon theapplication of pressure thereto. Such reduction in peripheral rolllength causes the hair to lose contact with the surface of the rollerand bunch up and consequently tangle. I have therefore developed a hairroller which is capable of deformation about its longitudinal axis incompression but maintains a constant perimeter during such distortions.

My invention broadly takes the form of a cylindrical roller formed ofplastic or other deformable material and having transverse end sectionswhich are sealed with wall sections so as to form a central air chamberalong a major portion of the rollers length. Such roller is capable ofbeing bent about its longitudinal axis or com: pressed but during suchdistortions its perimeter remains of a constant length so that the hairwrapped around it deforms in a similar manner and remains in contactwith it. This central chamber may be filled with air or with adeformable medium such as a plastic foam but it is .pssential that thechamber be sealed at its end so it maintains substantially the samevolume independent of the shape it is forced into so that its perimeterremains approximately constant.

Other objects, advantages, and applications of the present inventionwill be made apparent by the following detailed description of apreferred embodiment of the invention. The description makes referenceto the accompanying drawings in which:

FIGURE 1 is a perspective view of the rollers as worn by a woman insleepingposition with her head resting on a pillow;

FIGURE 2 is an end view of the first embodiment of the roller;

FIGURE 3 is a side view of the roller of FIGURE 2; FIGURE 4 is adetailed view of the roller as it appears in FIGURE 1 illustrating itsmanner of distortion;

FIGURE 5 is a longitudinal section of the roller of FIGURE 2 taken alongline 5--5 of FIGURE 3;

FIGURE 6 is a sectional view of a second embodiment of the roller takenalong line 66 of FIGURE 7;

3,139,889 Patented July 7, 1964 FIGURE 7 is a longitudinal view of theroller of FIG- URE 6 taken along line 77 of FIGURE 6;

FIGURE 8 is a perspective view of a clip which is useful in connectionwith the roller of FIGURES 6 and 7; and

FIGURE 9 is a longitudinal sectional view, partly broken away, of theclip of FIGURE 8 in use on a roller of FIGURES 6 and 7.

The roller is formed about a cylindrical tube 10 which may be formed ofa plastic or rubber having a high degree of resiliency. A pair of endwalls 12 are disposed transversely across the tube 10 inwardly from theterminations thereof. The end walls 12 seal off a central air chamber 14within the tube 10.

The outer surface of the cylinder 10 may be provided with a plurality ofshort brushes 16 spaced at regular intervals with respect to oneanother. These brushes 16 act to retain Wound hair about the cylinder 10and may take a variety of forms. Embodiments of the invention may bealso provided wherein the cylinder 10 is not provided with protrusionssuch as the brushes 16 but rather have a smooth outer surface to whichwetted hair may be adhered by adhesion action.

The manner in which hair 18 may be wound about the roller of FIGURES 1through 5 is illustrated in detail in FIGURE 4. With the head 22 of thewearer supported on a pillow 20, the cross-section of the roller 10 isdistorted out of a uniform circular shape. However, as is noted inFIGURE 4, the outer perimeter of the roller maintains a constant length,generally independent of the distortion, so that the hair 18 ismaintained in intimate contact with the roller. This results from theair trapped within the chamber 14 acting to balloon out the rollersection at points transverse to those between which pressure is applied.In previous resilient rollers formed of soft rubber or sponge-likematerials without an air chamber, pressure caused the cross-section todistort in such a manner as to change the perimeter and therefore causethe hair to move away from the sides of the roller and become tangled.

A spring clip 24 of a well-known type may be utilized to retain the hair18 in contact with the roller surface 10. However, such a clip does notobviate the difficulties caused with resilient rollers of the type knownto the prior art.

A second embodiment of the invention is illustrated in FIGURES 6 through9. A cylindrical tube 26 of resilient plastic or rubber has a pair ofend walls 28 at its extremities. The end walls are pierced by a centralaxial passage 30 so as to form an annular air. chamber 32 which acts inthe same manner as the air chamber 14 of the first embodiment todistribute pressures exerted on the roller so as to maintain itsperimeter relatively constant in length. Brushes 34 are provided on theouter sides of the tube 26 to retain the hair. The central passage 30 isadapted to be used in connection with a clip of the type illustrated inFIGURE 8. This clip has a pair of parallel prongs 36 which are connectedby a transverse end section 38 to a third prong 40. As is illustrated inFIG- URE 9, the prong 40 is adapted to be retained within thecylindrical passage 30 while the two prongs 36 are adapted to extendalong the outer surface 26 and press hair against that surface.

The primary feature of both embodiments is the central air chamber whichin other embodiments may be filled with a cellular interconnected foammaterial (not shown) in order to vary the resiliency of the roller.

Having thus described my invention, I claim:

A hair roller formed of a resilient material and comprising asubstantially impermeable cylindrical outer wall and a pair ofsubstantially impermeable cylindrical end walls extending transverselyto the axis of said cylinder spaced inwardly of the ends thereof, andhaving their peripheries sealed to said outer wall so as to form asealed central air chamber between said outer wall and said end wallsand a pair of cylindrical open-ended chambers withing said outer Wall atopposing ends of said cylinder.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTSFOREIGN PATENTS Great Britain Oct. 16,

